A swarm in April........

There is an ancient bee keeping saying that goes:-

a swarm in May is worth a load of hay; a swarm in June is worth a silver spoon; but a swarm in July is not worth a fly

To which the only reasonable response can be 'Eh??'

What this means is that a swarm at the beginning of the season is good news. The swarm containing the old queen has plenty of time to establish itself in its new home whereas the new queen in the old hive will hopefully have mated properly with the many male drones that are around at the beginning of the season.
The reverse is true for a swarm at the end of the season.

Each year a local bee keeper I know breaks one of bee keeping's Golden Rules - 'You don't go on holiday in May' as this is the start of the swarming season and if a colony swarms when you are not around you could lose half of the bees.
He asked me if I could check for the signs of early swarming in some of his hives and as we at last have had some warm weather I did it yesterday [30th April]. There was nothing to worry about but as I had to go past Scald End on the way home I thought I would have a quick look to see how they were getting on..
As I have only just got another 4x4 I have only managed to make one short visit to put supers on all hives to try to delay swarming.

As I approached the first hive there were a few more flying bees than I expected. Less than a yard away from the hive was a swarm hanging in a bush. Blimey

Update 4th May

I put two pints of syrup in their feeder and after just three days its all gone.
Also bees are bringing in pollen which is a sign she's laying.